Misfitmorgan's Journal - That Summer Dust

[misfitmorgan]

Whoa, nice!

Time to seriously look at other properties, something will come up, you just need to be looking when it shows up. 7% is ridiculous given bank loans on houses is more like 4%. If you can dump the $100 on your car loan and pay it off early, that is likely a good bet. I don't suppose it is a low interest loan and that can't be written off your income taxes so it is nothing but a loss.

That property you like probably wasn't affected by the housing bubble bursting. They are asking what they HOPE some clueless rich person from out of the area will pay. How long has it been on the market? The price will come down when no "big city slicker that has no idea what it is really worth" comes by and plunks down the asking price or close to it.

Exactly, they are hoping the downstate people who like to come up here and hunt will come pay the insane price. We went and looked at the property last night, the ad boosts "32x40 Barn, 40x50 Barn, 32x40 Building, 20x28 Detached Garage And a 26x40 Storage Building."

In reality the 26x40 storage building is newer maybe 20-30years old it has a lean-to on the south side of it for tractor storage and that building is in good shape. The garage was likely built in the 40-50s and we didnt see inside of it because the man door was locked or doesnt open not sure which. The main barn is 40x50 but it has two walls shifted from frost/corrosion(a lot) and half of the hay loft has collapsed, it has an addition on the side of it with a milk parlor and all the head gates still there, the floors are all cement through out though. The other 32x40 barn is a potato storage barn and also needs some foundation work but not like the barn, just needs some new cement buttress's put in. The potato barn would make a nice barn for goats,sheep, or pigs, the only problem there is it is right next to the property line and sandwiched between the property line and the driveway for the barns/hay field on that side. The 26x40 storage building is half of an old corn crib turned on its side so it is a half circle of tin/frame with no floor. There are also two other buildings on the property what looks like an old chicken coop with a chicken wire yard outside and i have no idea what the other building is DH looked in it and had the door shut again before i got a look. I believe both of these buildings would need to be taken apart and re-assembled but only because they are leaning, the foundations seem good on those from what i can see and they are small buildings maybe 22x16 each. The place looks like an old dairy farm and by old i mean like before large chill tanks, the cooler for the full size tin milk cans is still in the corner of the front room of the barn. If there is/was a modern chill tank i am not sure.

The tour of the place DH and i took was "unguided" and near dark lol. HD says the buildings are all fixable and aside from the main barn shouldnt take much money to fix. The loft that collapsed is we think atm from the two walls frost heaving out and the support beams losing their perch because of it. The entire loft and all of it parts looks to be there and besides some floor boards breaking the beams all look good. DH says if we crib the barn, then shove those two walls back in and sandwich the two falling walls with 8-10" of cement on either side in a wedge it should fix the foundation for our lifetime at least. The first step would be crib the barn anywhere possible and then remove the loft parts. The roof was cross cabled already.

Now for the really unimpressive part...the buildings all have stuff in them. Old stuff like an old snowmobile from probly the 60s or 70s, and other random old stuff. It is not like the place we are on now that has just junk piled in, this seems to be put in the buildings in some kind of order and actually like it was in "storage" or put away. The amount of stuff there is concerning though as i don't know where they would put it all if the place sold.

As far as outside stuff there are some fenced off areas but i couldnt tell if it was bobwire or electric or what because by the time i tried to look it was almost dark and i wasnt walking out in the long wet grass at night on property i dont know and look for bobwire lol. They do have some stuff outside behind and to the north of the barn but it is pretty minimal and mostly all metal from what we could tell.

So yes definitely need to come down on price because all total it is probly going to cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $30-40,000 to fix the buildings.

The house is cute and had forced air and a outdoor wood furance, we did notice someone glued thin sheets of foam insulation around the cement block foundation and it looks like it has a basement but there is no mention of a basement in the listing other then a michigan basement. Anyhow the foam could be hinting at some sort of heating problem. The house was built in 1937 and was well cared for you can tell until about 10-12yrs ago...when it changed owners. The new owners appear to have used it for a hunting camp/place for their nearly adult kids to go play on/Up north get away and did little to nothing in the way of general upkeep such as new paint or caulk type of things. They did put in a new 5" well and build two bedrooms and an area for a bathroom in the one storage building by the house, which does have heat.

Really they need to come down about 40k before it would be reasonable.

If I had the fluid money I would also give you a private mtg but I just don't. I cannot believe that land prices there are so low compared to here in Va.
If it were me, I would pay off the car early. You will be saving all around, give you a more liquid cash flow to put away towards a down payment, or to just have for an emergency fund once you find something else and can meet whatever down payment you need.
I also would obviously not do one more thing to clean up or fix anything there, and I would be very careful to itemize and take pictures of all equipment that is yours. I wouldn't trust them to not try to claim more stuff that is yours as they have tried to do in the past. Rabbit cages, hay feeders, EVERYTHING. Maybe put it all in one place and keep it together so that it doesn't grow legs...

Also, get the lowered rent payment in writing....for your protection.

Thank you so much! Definitely planned on getting the rent change in writing. Land is cheap cheap here. I'm waiting to hear back from my loan company on what my payoff would be for the car.

We have pictures and videos of everything from the day we got on the place, thru to the day we moved in and will take more when we leave. We didn't plan on doing anything else and DH say when we move he is taking the stalls down and taking the wood with us lol.

I just read through many pages of your journal, somehow I missed many notifications.

Sorry about the dealings with the owners and the financing. Have you considered having a new manufactured home placed on the land? You can get a small one at reasonable prices and then check out USDA (not FSA) for a home loan. I am also surprised that the FSA turned you down as the Farm Ownership loan requires NO current or previous farm ownership requirements. Also, what about a personal loan from a place like Discover, Prosper, or Lending Club? I also got a 50,000 signature loan a few years back from Bank of America. The terms wouldn't be the best but if you own the land it might make it easier to get a refi in a year or two. After refinancing our house last year and buying the land next to us I feel your pain, stuff like this can be impossible.

No worries Babs it does the same thing to me with your journal, i have to keep checking there manually.

Far as the FSA goes she printed off the requirements thing and sent it with our denial letter and it does clearly state you must prove farm profit for at least 3 of the past 10years in a minimum of $1,000 (which apprently has to be on your tax returns but it doesnt say that part). Why she didnt just give us that in the first place i dont know. It always says you must prove farm experience for 3 of the past 10 years on the website and for "experience" i guess she used the profit thing , i dunno exactly how she does it but she told me that we didnt qualify for it because we couldnt show profit and appeared to just be a hobby farm. I don't know of anyone who would classify a farm that has row crops of corn and oats and makes 3,000+ bales of hay a year as a hobby farm but apparently she does. I asked her if there were any other programs we could do and she said no.

The problem with putting a house on would be the bank, the bank requires the home be a minimum of 900sqft for new construction and with the cost of the house, inspections, well ,septic and drain field, etc plus the cost of the property it would put us at $140,000 or more but even with a new house the property isnt worth 140k unless it was a large house which then would mean the price to put it on would be more lol. If the other buildings were in good shape it would be and it was landscaped nice maybe but it is only 20 acres with about 7 trees on it so there can only be so much value.
The other place we are looking at now is for 80 acres with a 1bd 1bath nice house and a very large double deck plus room for 2 more bedrooms upstairs. It is 60% wooded with a stream that runs thru the backside of the property and a bridge over it along with trails throughtout the woods and ground and raised blinds. Plus the 2 bedrooms and area for a bathroom in the one outbuilding plus the other out buildings....and is still only $139,000 asking price which is to high for what it is.

I could get a loan thru them but i checked thru the pre-approval thing and it says interest rates up to 36% interest. Admittedly 36% i like to this is for bad credit but even at say 10% on 45k that isnt really a realistic loan option because the plan was to buy the place and then 1 year later go get a tractor, trailer and truck financed.

The problem is that they don't own the land and given how whacky the current owners seem to be, even if they agreed to let @misfitmorgan put a new manufactured home on it (talk about a huge financial risk), they might change their minds on the property or the selling price.

Seems to me all this is just a sign that the property is NOT what they should be buying. "Their" property is somewhere else.

We still love the barn lol. I think babs ment if we did the new construction loan.

I agree i am feeling less and less like this is where we are ment to be. We have tried everything short of putting ourselves so deep in depth we won't claw our way out for the next 20years which we don't want.

 

[misfitmorgan]

Yeah, @Bruce , I tend to agree that their property is somewhere else. Too much aggravation, too much work, too much mess, too much fixing up to do, too much BS with the current owners. But I well understand that you see something, think it will be a good deal, start doing stuff, see the potential, and put alot of yourself into it.....but, believe me, life is too short to continue to beat your head against the wall ; OR to saddle yourself with something that will be an even bigger millstone around your neck, down the road.
Misfit...I think you have better things coming, just let it happen. When it does you will say, whew, so glad we didn't get stuck with that other place.

I know, we have been fighting an uphill battle to get this place and make things work on it since before we even moved in and i am tired of it. The owners are not willing to work with us anymore. They will not move anymore of their stuff off or clean up any of their junk or give us a land contract so we are done with them and will rent until we find a place.

Buy the land with a construction loan. It would lock the current owners into a contract that they can't back out of. As part of the construction loan the house gets placed on the land and then it is converted to a conventional loan when the house is done. It would be the same as buying vacant land and putting a home on it. USDA does not require a down payment either.

As far as this not being "their" spot, that may be the case. Years and years ago I "laid down the fleece" on a house...if the financing went through we would buy it; if not, I would not pursue other options and we would walk away. DH was newly self employed so we had no verifiable income and they wouldn't give us the loan. I regretted that decision on my part for the next 15 years.

There may very well be a better home but I know they like this one so just laying out some options that maybe (doubtful...I'm sure she has covered all her bases) she didn't think of.

That's what i kept telling myself Babs thats why i did check every possible solution but honestly im sick of fighting to try to stay on that property. We love the location, we love the barn....thats it. The other place i keep talking about is literally 4 houses away from this place...same location....similar barn...4 times the acerage and a nice house lol.

I think DH can get a FHA loan on this other place by himself but i dunno what the requirements are for FHA if they would do 80 acres, etc. I know they are really strict on everything having to be just so. We have enough down payment to do a regular loan with 10% down atm but that puts us into PMI which we dont really want. If i pay off the car it will take us a couple months to save up the extra to make 15% down payment which still puts us in PMI but only for 2.5 years.

 

[Bruce]

Really they need to come down about 40k before it would be reasonable.

Offer them $50K less, mention all the structural issues with the barns and storage buildings, and see what happens. Same question as before, how long has it been on the market?

I could get a loan thru them but i checked thru the pre-approval thing and it says interest rates up to 36% interest.

Usury rates! The unreasonable credit card rates are less. Even with so-so credit the rate on a 30 year, 20% down, no points should be less than 5%.

 

[babsbag]

The only problem I had with FHA was that they didn't want to finance income producing property and since I file a schedule F they were hesitant. Every underwriter is different, even for the same loan, and we finally found one that realized that the "farm" is not our income and they were ok with it. I seem to recall that there was some limit on the amount of land we could buy, but maybe not. I do pay PMI, oh well, it is what it is. The only thing the inspector looked at closely was the roof, the height of the deck (I have no deck railing), the wood stove installation, and making sure we had permits on the out buildings. It was not the inspection from hell that I had always heard about.

I would check for a USDA home loan, I have heard good things about them but we never qualified because it is based on income for the area. I live in a super depressed area income wise but my DH works 2.5 hours away and makes way more than the median income for the area we live in.

Sounds like it is time for a move.

ETA: you could try the FSA loan again and ask about the Beginner's Ranchers and Farmers, but plan on a LONG escrow. It took us almost 180 days just to buy a piece of land. But they do let you know withing 60 days if you qualify or not. With FSA the earlier in the fiscal year you apply the more likely you are to get funded. They frequently run out of money. They also have a down payment assistance program.

 

[Gorman Farm]

We bought our little farm USDA, my other half worked over an hour away from here and made more I am sure than the median income here. It was a pretty simple process, they are a little less conservative on credit scores, and they don't mind if you are going to earn income from the property. You do have agree to make it your main residence for at least 5 years I think it was. They do their own inspection of property and do require certain safety issues to be addressed before processing the loan. We had to come to the property and reset some deck stairs that were not to code, get rid of a yellow jackets nest, and replace an outer door to the home that wasn't sealed right. After that was done it was like 2 weeks and the loan went right through we were in the home 30 days later.

 

[Latestarter]

I checked in to USDA when I was coming down here to TX... With the USDA you have income restrictions and the property has to have like 80% of the purchase value in the house, NOT the land, and even though it's from USDA, it is not an ag loan... go figure. It's actually to try and get people to re-inhabit depressed areas to boost local economies through property tax income. With FHA, they will not finance land. They strictly finance homes. I believe their upper limit is like 15-20 acres and may be less depending on location. VA has no acreage restrictions, however, they will not finance a "farm" that is "for profit". That was the nightmare situation I had to deal with as the purchase offer was written up on a farm and ranch purchase offer vice a standard residential purchase offer.

I hope whatever you decide to do it works out for you and soon... Planting time is coming up fast and it would suck to lose another year. I'd put a realistic value purchase offer on the 80 acre property and see if they'll offer owner financing at say 6-7%. Savings accounts are paying <1% interest. I'd say that would be a good investment since they aren't local anyway.

 

[farmerjan]

One thing I would be careful of. Here in Va, if you do any kind of improvements and they are "attached" you cannot legally take them. We have gates "TIED" up on several farms because to "hang them" on hinges or the hinge pins, would constitute being attached. Really...so I cuss and drag gates open and shut on a couple of places since we can't see putting a $100 gate here and there....and then losing the rent. So make sure that you will not run into problems taking the stalls and all out of where you are now.

We just found out friday we are losing a place we have had rented for years. They have had it for sale, taken it off the market, decided to sell a piece, changed their mind....over and over. We offered to buy it all; put a 20% down payment, with them holding the mortgage; to save them cap gains and give them a very comfortable yearly income. Now, this is 100 acres of very worn out land, because they never put fertilizer or anything on it, "wish" fences on 90% of it ( fences that are wished up ha ha), but it lays nice and is close to where we have other pasture. Has a nice old restored house that needs a little work, and a big old log barn that needs alot of work before it starts to really fall apart.
They had listed it for 1.2 mil, then came down to $850,000. We finally came to an agreement...and they were going to have rights to stay in the house, for I think 10 years, for $550,000. They would be getting a monthly check, not have to pay taxes, or do maintainance, really get paid to live there with a chunk of money down....and it was for 25 years I think. Anyway, we were at the paperwork stage and her daughter said that it was a bad deal, that it wasn't fair that they would not be getting a chunk of money but payments along....In other words, the kids wouldn't have a "big inheritance" to look forward to, because the parents would be having the the future inheritance to live on. I mean, they would be getting 100,000+ chunk to start with....so they backed out.
So now, they are selling 60 acres of it, and don't want to fence off the part they are keeping with the house separate, so will be letting the buyer of the 60 acres "rent" the other 30 or so acres. They need to do work on the house they said, to be able to sell it in the next year or 2. I will bet that they will not be getting 250,000 for the 60 acres and with the markets the way they are, they will not get 350,00 for the house and the remaining 30 acres. Plus will be putting money into the house to get it fixed up to sell....have to pay cap gains on the land sale, and in the end will come out with less than what they would have gotten from us with no costs to live there for 10 years except their normal electric, propane, whatever all else daily bills.

So we just said fine, we are done, back when they changed their mind; and my son bought 75 acres for 3,000 an acre, and a year later bought the house on 2 acres that went with the 75 acres, when the guy couldn't make the payments because he wouldn't work. Now we are trying to buy the 30 acres that was split off a couple of years earlier, to put the farm back together to better utilize the barns that were surveyed off in a screwed up mess. Land here is in the 5-10,000 per acre range.
We have a friend whose wife passed away last year that has a REAL NICE totally restored older house on 25 acres that can't get it sold for 400,000 and it is all fenced with a huge, completely restored, fixed up bank barn. I'm talking a showplace. If we hadn't gone and bought that 75 acres, then the house piece to put it back together , we would have bought this other place in a heartbeat. But, it wasn't for sale then, and no thoughts that it would be until she got sick and died of cancer. Can't possibly buy it now....

But what I got sidetracked was that the place we are losing, we have 5 or 6 gates that I can think of, and they are NOT on the hinges, so we are going to take everything that is ours, with us. Have to get everything out by the 20th of april I think....barely a months notice. And we are calving cows there now, so I pray they are all done calving in the next 3 weeks.
We rebuilt the catch pen a couple of years ago, not all new, but some new posts and boards where it was falling apart because we needed a place to be able to work the cows in. That will have to stay, and it isn't alot of money but a fair amount of time and sweat in it. We have benefitted from it, but still....
Thank goodness we hadn't walked all the fences and done any work on them for this year. We try to go around all pasture fences in the early spring before the leaves come out so that we can do any repair/rebuilding that needs to be done.
So believe me, there are other options, and sometimes you do miss out on some things....but you take what you can and go from there.

 

[misfitmorgan]

Offer them $50K less, mention all the structural issues with the barns and storage buildings, and see what happens. Same question as before, how long has it been on the market?


Usury rates! The unreasonable credit card rates are less. Even with so-so credit the rate on a 30 year, 20% down, no points should be less than 5%.

The place has been for sale for 7 months but they just re-listed with a different company and in doing so dropped the price by 50k so i dont think they would take 50k less then the new price atm lol. It has only been the new price for like 3 weeks.

Usary laws dont cover those kinds of places because the loans are not marketed as mortgages or home loans, they are just personal loans pretty much.

The only problem I had with FHA was that they didn't want to finance income producing property and since I file a schedule F they were hesitant. Every underwriter is different, even for the same loan, and we finally found one that realized that the "farm" is not our income and they were ok with it. I seem to recall that there was some limit on the amount of land we could buy, but maybe not. I do pay PMI, oh well, it is what it is. The only thing the inspector looked at closely was the roof, the height of the deck (I have no deck railing), the wood stove installation, and making sure we had permits on the out buildings. It was not the inspection from hell that I had always heard about.

I would check for a USDA home loan, I have heard good things about them but we never qualified because it is based on income for the area. I live in a super depressed area income wise but my DH works 2.5 hours away and makes way more than the median income for the area we live in.

Sounds like it is time for a move.

ETA: you could try the FSA loan again and ask about the Beginner's Ranchers and Farmers, but plan on a LONG escrow. It took us almost 180 days just to buy a piece of land. But they do let you know withing 60 days if you qualify or not. With FSA the earlier in the fiscal year you apply the more likely you are to get funded. They frequently run out of money. They also have a down payment assistance program.

We both work full time so hopefully the farm income wouldnt be an issue. I am worried on the limit to land for FHA, i can't find where it states what the limit is. The roof likes like a newer roof like it was done within the past 10yrs, it may have been done when the house was sold 12yrs ago or shortly after. Basically it looks a litle weathered but the shingles are not coming apart, there are no low spots etc that we could see. Both decks have railings all the way around so no issue there and the lower deck has newer decking on it. The wood stove appears to be a boiler no direct piping and i am still not sure if it heats the house and the bunk/guest/storage building or just the house or just the bunk, etc. The permits might be a problem, as i mentioned i suspected the buildings were put up in the 30-40s or prior to that and i was correct. Turns out that our farming buddy's Aunt and Uncle used to own that very farm so he gave us some info on it and who they were. I dunno what the inspection guidelines are but i do know my friend got her FHA loan 4yrs ago and they were ridiculous even to the point that she had to install a new shower in the basement because the one that was in there had a crack in it...this was a second bathroom she didnt even plan on using lol.

We would qualify for the Section 502 Guaranteed Rural Housing Loan Program but we were told that Loan and a FSA loan are the same thing thru the same office and same branch. We originally went in looking for a USDA Direct Loan(before DH got his raise) and we were told FSA was the USDA home loan and that was the process we had to go thru. NOOOOO!
I also asked about the beginners farmers and ranchers program and was told it has the exact same requirements with the wording on the "experience" slightly different.
Normal ranch/farm loan -must have min 3yrs experience within the past 10yrs
Beginner's ranch/farm - must have min 3yrs experience but not more then 10yrs.
So she told us we still dont qualify. I did read thru the requirements in detail and the down payment program has the same requirements and i can't even do female farmer stuff because she says you have to prove you are a farmer still with the same requirements.
I do find it odd because when i was reading the beginning farmer requirements I read where it says you must have managerial duties for 1 full production cycle.....thats it. I can't even go argue with her either because she is the same person who determines if we get the loan or not.

USDA is Rural development and definately not the FSA. THe women who handles the loan stuff for FSA has only been there for a year and knows NOTHING about farming...i seriously am not sure how she got the job, i mean she is nice and all but no clue on how farming works i mean she didnt even know you could milk goats or that adult human drank goats milk.

Anywho i am looking into the USDA Rural development loans atm.

We bought our little farm USDA, my other half worked over an hour away from here and made more I am sure than the median income here. It was a pretty simple process, they are a little less conservative on credit scores, and they don't mind if you are going to earn income from the property. You do have agree to make it your main residence for at least 5 years I think it was. They do their own inspection of property and do require certain safety issues to be addressed before processing the loan. We had to come to the property and reset some deck stairs that were not to code, get rid of a yellow jackets nest, and replace an outer door to the home that wasn't sealed right. After that was done it was like 2 weeks and the loan went right through we were in the home 30 days later.

We would LOVE that to happen....my concern is the other buildings that are not the house and the fact it is 80 acres, i'm not sure it would qualify for rural development.

I checked in to USDA when I was coming down here to TX... With the USDA you have income restrictions and the property has to have like 80% of the purchase value in the house, NOT the land, and even though it's from USDA, it is not an ag loan... go figure. It's actually to try and get people to re-inhabit depressed areas to boost local economies through property tax income. With FHA, they will not finance land. They strictly finance homes. I believe their upper limit is like 15-20 acres and may be less depending on location. VA has no acreage restrictions, however, they will not finance a "farm" that is "for profit". That was the nightmare situation I had to deal with as the purchase offer was written up on a farm and ranch purchase offer vice a standard residential purchase offer.

I hope whatever you decide to do it works out for you and soon... Planting time is coming up fast and it would suck to lose another year. I'd put a realistic value purchase offer on the 80 acre property and see if they'll offer owner financing at say 6-7%. Savings accounts are paying <1% interest. I'd say that would be a good investment since they aren't local anyway.

We meet the restrictions for the USDA Rural Development "Guarantee" but not direct, we make to much for direct it says. I wonder if the gurantee is the same rules since it runs thru a normal bank/CU. I dont think the house would be worth 80% of the asking price that's 111k and i have no idea how to value a house, the entire property is tax assessed at $148,400 but taxed at $89,938 as agriculture residential...which is odd because near as i can tell they used that for a hunting camp and no one lived there for many years or took hay or anything from it. We cant do VA neither of us were military.

Boy i am long winded arnt i lol.

 

[misfitmorgan]

One thing I would be careful of. Here in Va, if you do any kind of improvements and they are "attached" you cannot legally take them. We have gates "TIED" up on several farms because to "hang them" on hinges or the hinge pins, would constitute being attached. Really...so I cuss and drag gates open and shut on a couple of places since we can't see putting a $100 gate here and there....and then losing the rent. So make sure that you will not run into problems taking the stalls and all out of where you are now.

We just found out friday we are losing a place we have had rented for years. They have had it for sale, taken it off the market, decided to sell a piece, changed their mind....over and over. We offered to buy it all; put a 20% down payment, with them holding the mortgage; to save them cap gains and give them a very comfortable yearly income. Now, this is 100 acres of very worn out land, because they never put fertilizer or anything on it, "wish" fences on 90% of it ( fences that are wished up ha ha), but it lays nice and is close to where we have other pasture. Has a nice old restored house that needs a little work, and a big old log barn that needs alot of work before it starts to really fall apart.
They had listed it for 1.2 mil, then came down to $850,000. We finally came to an agreement...and they were going to have rights to stay in the house, for I think 10 years, for $550,000. They would be getting a monthly check, not have to pay taxes, or do maintainance, really get paid to live there with a chunk of money down....and it was for 25 years I think. Anyway, we were at the paperwork stage and her daughter said that it was a bad deal, that it wasn't fair that they would not be getting a chunk of money but payments along....In other words, the kids wouldn't have a "big inheritance" to look forward to, because the parents would be having the the future inheritance to live on. I mean, they would be getting 100,000+ chunk to start with....so they backed out.
So now, they are selling 60 acres of it, and don't want to fence off the part they are keeping with the house separate, so will be letting the buyer of the 60 acres "rent" the other 30 or so acres. They need to do work on the house they said, to be able to sell it in the next year or 2. I will bet that they will not be getting 250,000 for the 60 acres and with the markets the way they are, they will not get 350,00 for the house and the remaining 30 acres. Plus will be putting money into the house to get it fixed up to sell....have to pay cap gains on the land sale, and in the end will come out with less than what they would have gotten from us with no costs to live there for 10 years except their normal electric, propane, whatever all else daily bills.

So we just said fine, we are done, back when they changed their mind; and my son bought 75 acres for 3,000 an acre, and a year later bought the house on 2 acres that went with the 75 acres, when the guy couldn't make the payments because he wouldn't work. Now we are trying to buy the 30 acres that was split off a couple of years earlier, to put the farm back together to better utilize the barns that were surveyed off in a screwed up mess. Land here is in the 5-10,000 per acre range.
We have a friend whose wife passed away last year that has a REAL NICE totally restored older house on 25 acres that can't get it sold for 400,000 and it is all fenced with a huge, completely restored, fixed up bank barn. I'm talking a showplace. If we hadn't gone and bought that 75 acres, then the house piece to put it back together , we would have bought this other place in a heartbeat. But, it wasn't for sale then, and no thoughts that it would be until she got sick and died of cancer. Can't possibly buy it now....

But what I got sidetracked was that the place we are losing, we have 5 or 6 gates that I can think of, and they are NOT on the hinges, so we are going to take everything that is ours, with us. Have to get everything out by the 20th of april I think....barely a months notice. And we are calving cows there now, so I pray they are all done calving in the next 3 weeks.
We rebuilt the catch pen a couple of years ago, not all new, but some new posts and boards where it was falling apart because we needed a place to be able to work the cows in. That will have to stay, and it isn't alot of money but a fair amount of time and sweat in it. We have benefitted from it, but still....
Thank goodness we hadn't walked all the fences and done any work on them for this year. We try to go around all pasture fences in the early spring before the leaves come out so that we can do any repair/rebuilding that needs to be done.
So believe me, there are other options, and sometimes you do miss out on some things....but you take what you can and go from there.

Luckily here any improvements we make to the property whether rented or leased with-in reason can be taken with you. So stalls we put up we can take, gates and pasture, fence posts we can take all of that legally. You can not however put in a well or fertilize and try to take it back lol. You also are not allowed to put in new windows, doors, drywall, etc and then take it back unless you replace it with something else that is equal to or better then the original thing that was there because that would be causing the owner an unfair burden of money loss. If you have anything in writing that says you are allowed to improve the property and they terminate the lease thru no fault of your own you can take them to court the judge will award you up to 70% of the cost of any improvements...so there is that.

I'm sorry your losing your rented pasture, that always sucks we lost a few of our hay fields and that is a pain in itself.

Price per acreage here for bare land is between $400-1,500/acre depending on where it is/near. You can easily go out and buy a vacant area of say 3-4 acres for $3,500

This place sold not to long ago for $160,550
105 acres, house, barns, already fenced etc.
Original asking price - $178,900
Lowered asking price - $169,000
https://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sa....246155,44.394296,-83.704148_rect/10_zm/1_rs/

 

[Gorman Farm]

We meet the restrictions for the USDA Rural Development "Guarantee" but not direct, we make to much for direct it says. I wonder if the gurantee is the same rules since it runs thru a normal bank/CU. I dont think the house would be worth 80% of the asking price that's 111k and i have no idea how to value a house, the entire property is tax assessed at $148,400 but taxed at $89,938 as agriculture residential...which is odd because near as i can tell they used that for a hunting camp and no one lived there for many years or took hay or anything from it. We cant do VA neither of us were military.

Boy i am long winded arnt i lol.

Ours is a guarantee loan, You do have to pay a small annual fee for that, they roll it into the loan, but you also have the option of zero down payment with it.